Live knitting show leads Norway's slow TV trend

A bizarre new television trend is taking over in Norway which sees everyday events broadcast for hours on end.

The phenomenon entitled slow TV, involves live primetime broadcasts of events such as burning fires, a woman knitting and a seven-hour train journey.

Moving away from the more commonplace reality TV formats such as talent shows and fly on the wall documentaries it seeks to depict everyday life in real-time.

Time Magazine reports that an evening of minute-by-minute knitting is due to be broadcast, which is sure to appeal to the nation's craft fans who are keen to watch knitting in practice.

It could also prove to be very relaxing background viewing for people working on their very own knitting patterns.

Other programmes have followed a train journey across the country from Oslo to Bergen and a five-day live 2011 broadcast of a cruise ship travelling up the Norwegian west coast.

It has also been rumoured that a live feed of construction workers making a digital clock from wood are being considered.

Commenting on this perhaps surprising TV trend, Rune Moklebust who leads slow TV programming at the channel NRK told Time that "this is a different way of telling a story. It is more strange. The more wrong it gets, the more right it is".

The Norwegian public have certainly taken to this trend and viewing figures have remained positive for the past few slow TV shows.

This includes a recent 18-hour live show of salmon spawning upstream, which reportedly received feedback from viewers that it was in fact too short.

Slow TV is definitely rather unusual, especially when other countries are competing to run fast-paced entertainment shows filled with twists and turns, however this back to broadcasting basics approach appears to be doing well in Norway. However, it remains to be seen as to whether any other nations may choose to embrace this trend.